Wednesday, October 1, 2014

Review: MISERY BAY by Steve Hamilton

MISERY BAY by Steve Hamilton (2012)

Reviewed by Craig Sisterson

Following the acclaim for, and award-winning success of, his standalone thriller starring a mute safe-cracker, The Lock Artist, US crime writer Steve Hamilton brings back to the page his troubled hero, ex-cop Alex McKnight, for the first time in several years.

McKnight, a former city cop from Detroit still haunted by his own bloodstained past, finds himself investigating the hanging suicide of a young University student in the frozen wilderness of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula – prodded by the most unlikely person to ask for his help; his old nemesis, the local police chief. What seems like a simple quest to find some answers for a grieving father turns into something far darker and more complicated when the body count begins to rise. Just how are a series of suicides and murders linked? Are the suicides what they seem, or is something more sinister at work?

Hamilton shows a nice touch for evoking a sense of the freezing expanses of the Upper Peninsula. Misery Bay starts with a slow burn, but then builds into a gripping tale that intrigues as much with its characters, especially McKnight, as the events and twists that power the storyline and keep you turning the page.

Have you read any of the Alex McKnight books? Which others would you recommend for me to read?

This book will represent 'Michigan' for my USA Fiction Challenge reading. 

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